Cut and Run (1985)

Original title: Inferno in Diretta

Director: Ruggero Deodato

Writers: Cesare Frugoni, Dardano Sacchetti, Luciano Vincenzoni

Composer: Claudio Simonetti

Starring: Lisa Blount, Leonard Mann, Willie Aames, Richard Lynch, Richard Bright, Michael Berryman, Eriq La Salle, Gabriele Tinti, Valentina Forte, John Steiner, Karen Black, Barbara Magnolfi

More info: IMDb

Tagline: The one story you won't be seeing on the 6 o'clock news!

Plot: A reporter and her cameraman connect a surviving Jonestown leader and a TV exec's missing son to a drug war where jungle installations are being massacred by an army of natives and a skilled white assassin.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again? Probably not.

Man, Deodato really knows how to open a picture!

That's just the first 7 minutes!!!  Of course you can't sustain a film with that kind of madness so you almost instantly prepare yourself for the slow bits of the movie.  Willie Aames was miscast.  He's terrible.  Otherwise the acting from everyone is OK and what you'd expect from a picture like this.  Berryman isn't in it much but he and his mug make for some very memorable moments.  Karen Black has even less to do.  I think all of her scenes are on one set and probably took all of a day or two to shoot.  This was intended to be a follow-up of sorts to Deotato's box office hit CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST (1980).  It's got cannibals and a jungle but it's a different film which is good.  The bits in this one that aren't in the jungle aren't nearly as fun, exciting or interesting as the jungle business. No surprises there. It's not that bad of a picture but it's nowhere good enough to justify much more than one watch considering the massive amount of other films of the sort from the 70s and 80s.  I may catch it again some day but not anytime soon.  The Anchor Bay DVD has a great anamorphic widescreen print and for extras there's the anamorphic widescreen trailer and a 16 minute featurette with interviews with Deodato, Lynch and Sacchetti and they don't pull their punches.  I love it when filmmakers have the balls to say what they think about a particular person.  It's not all roses and titties on a film set.  There's bound to be an actor or director that's an asshole sometimes.